Brain Food at Edinburgh International Science Festival

Timing is everything, folks. Here we are, with food being figuratively dragged through the mud because some folk have literally been horsing around with it. It’s all the fault of food scientists, with their white lab coats and mechanically recovered meat-based slurry. Bloody science.

Luckily, the Edinburgh International Science Festival returns this month just in the nick of time, with a whole host of food and science events to take our minds off the horses. In the spirit of the season, let’s don our goggles and hairnets, and investigate.

Given the current kerfuffle, is a talk on a concept that sounds like something from Brass Eye really the best place for the Festival’s food strand to begin? That’s what’s happening with Pie in the Sky (23 Mar, 8pm), where Colombia University professor Dickson Despommier will make his pitch for the need for vertical agriculture to feed an ever-growing population. As populations grow and are unable to resist the lure of the city, the theory is that all our food will have to be grown in upright farms, which are already being developed in Asia. Wait a minute, this was a sketch on Brass Eye! Talk about satire eating itself. What’s next, the sketch about people interfering with cows and... Oh...

Moving on, The Adaptation Diet (30 Mar, 5.30pm) tackles the issues of food supply and security. This talk is all about harnessing the power of science to craft solutions to the world’s hunger problems. From foraging in the wild to save some herbs a thousand-mile plane ride, to munching on insects because there are loads of them and they’re basically just chicken nuggets with loads of legs, see how changes in our understanding of science and the natural world can affect our eating habits. As the programme asks, “Would you tuck into a burger made from synthetic meat?” What’s that? You may as well have? Right...

Well, here’s a pair of fun events that should help science restore its rightful reputation as a force for good. Sensory Dining (1 Apr, 7pm) and Molecular Mastery (28 Apr, 8pm) should both bring some fun and unpredictability to proceedings. The Sensory Dining team of scientists, comedians and ‘scent technicians’ will be pulling all manner of tricks to make your dinner exciting and involving, while Molecular Mastery will harness the awesome power of molecular gastronomy, science’s upstart cousin, to produce amazing cocktails with all sorts of stuff flying out of them. Textures, flavours, colours, everything you think you know about food and drink will be challenged in these two events. By the end, you won’t know what you’re eating. Hmmm...

Let’s not forget that cooking itself is a relatively recent scientific discovery. Choosing Food: Past, Present and Future (3 Apr, 6pm) reminds us that until about 10,000 years ago we didn’t even know that fire plus meat equals tastiness. Since then, we’ve fried, grilled and smoked our way through thousands of years of shared history and heritage, and reached a point where we can take our pick of whatever grub we fancy. That’s the power of science, people. We can eat anything we want, from anywhere we choose. We can even eat extra bonus things we don’t want. Umm...

Food science hasn’t had a great run, but the Science Festival will tackle head-on the thorny issue of animals being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Ecosystems and habitats around the world are being damaged and altered by invading species interfering with the food chain. Deer causing hassle for other deer, big crazy crustaceans hassling smaller, more gentle crayfish, squirrels embroiled in some kind of ethnic gang war. But what’s to be done? Well, over a special dinner a group of conservationists and wildlife types will attempt to thrash out a solution. The title of this event? Eating Aliens.

That’s right, it’s called Eating Aliens (28 Mar, 7pm), and it will set out the argument that if an animal is causing you grief, the best solution is to eat it and move on. It makes sense – no sense in letting all those tasty, bullying crayfish go to waste. Plus, it’s topical, and as we said at the beginning timing is everything. Well played, science, you live to fight another day. After all, you shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth...